JPS6125197B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Technical Field] The present invention relates to a fare changing method in a vending machine, and relates to a fare changing method suitable for fare revision in, for example, an automatic ticket vending machine for railway tickets.

[Description of the Prior Art] An automatic ticket vending machine for railway tickets sells tickets with fares (fees) depending on the section of the train that the passenger rides, and usually has a customer service panel provided in front of the machine with the desired information. A number of account selection pushbutton switches are arranged for selecting fares. The fare is written on the surface of these selection pushbuttons/switches, or a display board on which the fare is written is affixed corresponding to the pushbutton/switch.
This is the oldest type of automatic ticket vending machine.

In such automatic ticket vending machines, when the fare is revised, it is necessary to change or replace the circuit section related to the fare, and also replace the above-mentioned push button switch on which the fare is written or the display board on which the fare is written. However, this work to revise fares required a lot of effort and a lot of money. This is because the fare revision work for automatic ticket vending machines must be completed within a short period of time from the last departure time of the train on the day before the fare revision date to the first train departure time on the revision date. This is because the line has many stations, and each station has many automatic ticket vending machines.

In order to simplify the fare revision work of such automatic ticket vending machines, automatic ticket vending systems such as those described in, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 72300/1983 have been devised. In this system, instead of writing the fare on the surface of the account selection pushbutton/switch of the automatic ticket vending machine or pasting a display board with the fare written on, a number is displayed corresponding to each pushbutton/switch. A tube is placed and the fare is displayed on this numerical display tube. Control of ticket vending operations, including control of displaying fares on the numeric display tube, is performed by a central control device that controls a plurality of automatic ticket vending machines.

However, since this automatic ticket vending system requires a central control device including a large-sized computer, there is a problem that installing this central control device at each station would be expensive. If you tried to control the automatic ticket vending machines at all stations with one centralized control device, you would have to install communication cables over long distances or use existing telephone lines, which would result in a large amount of expense. There is a problem.

Therefore, the fare to be displayed on the numeric display tube is stored in advance in the built-in memory of each automatic ticket vending machine, and when a coin is inserted, the fare is read from the memory and displayed on the numeric display tube. A method to do this has been devised and has been actually adopted (for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 84799/1983). With this automatic ticket vending machine, fare revision work can be done by simply exchanging the memory in which the old fare is stored with the memory in which the new fare is stored, or by rewriting the fare in the fare memory to the new fare. achieved.

However, even this method is not sufficient to complete fare revision work for a huge number of automatic ticket vending machines in a short period of time. This is because after replacing or rewriting the memory, it is essential to check whether the automatic ticket vending machine will operate with the revised fare. This is because there is a restriction that all automatic ticket vending machines in 2017 must be completed within a short period of time from the last train departure time on the day before the fare revision date to the first train departure time on the day of the revision date.

By the way, there is an automatic ticket gate that inspects tickets issued by an automatic ticket vending machine, instead of an automatic ticket vending machine, which is equipped with an old fare memory and a new fare memory (Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 133098/1983). . At the automatic ticket vending machine that issues tickets applied to this automatic ticket gate, a code indicating whether the ticket is for the old fare or the new fare is recorded on the ticket at the time of issuance. The automatic ticket gate reads the above code and the face data of the inserted ticket, and if the above code indicates the old fare, it compares the read face data with the data in the old fare memory and confirms that the above code is correct. If it indicates a new fare, the read ticket face data is compared with the data in the new fare memory. Additionally, if new fare data is compared,
The indicator light installed on the automatic ticket gate lights up.

In such automatic ticket gates, the memory can be replaced or rewritten at any time before the fare revision date, but it is not clear whether the automatic ticket gate will operate correctly with the new memory data or the rewritten data. It is difficult to confirm whether this is the case. This is because whether to refer to data in the old fare memory or new fare memory for ticket inspection processing is determined based on the above code recorded on the inserted ticket; This is because a ticket with a code indicating that it is necessary is required. In order to issue a ticket with a code indicating the new fare,
The fare data of at least one automatic ticket vending machine must be changed to the new fare.

[Purpose of the Invention] This invention not only makes it possible to replace or rewrite the memory in which the price is stored in a vending machine at any time before the price revision date, but also allows the user to replace or rewrite the memory that stores the price at any time before the price revision date. To provide a fee change method that allows easy operation confirmation of a vending machine.

[Configuration and Effects of the Invention] The present invention provides a plurality of numeric displays for displaying account charges, a plurality of account selection push buttons/switches provided corresponding to these numeric displays, and a system that stores account charges in advance. In a vending machine that is equipped with a central processing unit that controls sales processing such as price display and amount calculation on the numerical display, and sales processing such as discharging goods, the memory stores the price before the change and the price after the change. and the rate change date are stored in advance, and a date setter is provided on the operator side of the vending machine that allows the set date to be changed, and the date on the date setter and the rate change date stored in the memory are provided. and reads either the pre-change charge or the post-change charge according to the comparison result, and displays the charge on the numerical display and executes sales processing based on the read charge. shall be.

Therefore, the memory can be replaced or rewritten at any date and time before the rate change date.

Further, after replacing the memory, etc., it is possible to check the operation of the vending machine by simply changing the date on the date setter, so the operation check work is extremely easy.

Furthermore, on the day of the rate change, simply set the date on the date setter to that day's date, or if the date setter automatically ticks the date like a clock, the date will be automatically changed without any further action. By switching to a later rate, it is possible to achieve a significant reduction in the amount of work that workers have to do.

[Description of Embodiments] Hereinafter, embodiments in which the present invention is applied to an automatic ticket vending machine will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

In FIG. 1, the customer service panel provided on the front of the automatic ticket vending machine has a number of account selection pushbuttons/switches 31, 32...3 for selecting the desired fare.
9 are arranged. These pushbutton switches 31 to 39 are so-called illuminated pushbutton switches in which the pushbuttons themselves light up. Further, numeric display tubes 41, 42, . . . 49 are arranged corresponding to each of the push buttons/switches 31-39. The customer service panel also has push buttons to select routes for contacting other companies.
Switches 51 and 52 are provided. The coin verification device 53 determines the authenticity and type of a coin inserted into a hard slot provided in a customer service panel, and outputs a genuine coin signal representing the type if the coin is a genuine coin. The bill validating device 53 may include a bill validating mechanism (bill checker) for determining the authenticity and type of bills. The automatic ticket vending machine further includes a date setter 54 in which the date of each day is set by the station staff, and the amount, date of issue, name of issuing station, and number of issues printed on the surface of the ticket to be issued. It is equipped with a printing device 55 and a magnetic recording device 56 that magnetically records each of the above items on the back side of the ticket to be issued. The year, month, and day are set in the date setter 54. The output of the date setter 54 is used for printing the date of issue on the ticket and for fare revision processing to be described later. A digital clock can also be used as the date setter 54, in which case there is no need to change the date each day.
As the printing device 55, it is preferable to use a thermal printer that has a thermal print head consisting of a large number of minute heating elements and prints dots on recording paper that develops color when heated. Magnetic recording device 56 includes an encoder and a magnetic head for encoding the items to be magnetically recorded.

A central processing unit (hereinafter referred to as
50 (referred to as CPU). CPU5
0 is preferably a microprocessor. This CPU 50 includes a read-only memory (not shown) storing an execution program to be described later, a read-only memory (hereinafter referred to as ROM) 57 in which account fares are written in advance, and a random access memory (ROM) 57 for storing various data. It is equipped with a memory (hereinafter referred to as RAM) 58. ROM5
7 is area 81 that stores the old fare before the revision.
, an area 82 for storing the revised new fare, and an area 83 for storing the fare revision date. These fare storage areas 81 and 82 further include storage areas 60 and 7 for storing fares for accounts for company routes.
6 and storage areas 70, 75, 77, 78 for storing the fares of the accounts for each other company's routes represented by selection pushbutton switches 51, 52, respectively;
are provided for each. Looking at old fare storage area 81, storage area 6 for company routes
0 has 9 memory locations 61, 62...69, corresponding to each riding section, for example 70, 90,...
..., old values such as 270 (yen) are memorized in advance. 4 in the storage area 70 for other companies' routes.
There are two memory locations 71...74, which contain the old fares for each boarding section via a transfer station, for example 270,...
..., 350 (yen), etc. are stored in advance. Required old fares are similarly stored in the storage area 75 for other companies' routes. Similarly, in the new fare storage area 82, nine types of new fares corresponding to each boarding section are stored in the storage area 76 for own company routes, and nine types of new fares corresponding to each boarding section are stored in storage areas 77 and 78 for other companies' routes. Each new fare is memorized in advance. Furthermore, the date of fare revision is stored in advance in the storage area 83.

PAM58 includes illuminated pushbutton switch 3.
Corresponding to numbers 1 to 39, flag 9 for displaying the input amount range is used to light up these switches.
1, 92...99 are provided. When these flags 91-99 are set, the corresponding pushbutton switches 31-39 light up, respectively.
For example, when flag 91 is set, pushbutton switch 31 is lit, and when flag 92 is set, switch 32 is lit. Also, RAM
At 58, there is an area 10 for storing the input amount.
1. Area 10 that stores the amount of the ticket to be issued
2 is established, as well as an account 6 for company routes.
Area 103, which is used as a counter to count the number of times the fare is read out and designate the storage location to be read, when sequentially reading fares from each storage location 0 or 76; an area 104 for counting the number of readings and designating a storage location to be read out when reading fares from each storage location sequentially;
Each area 105 is provided to be used as a flag (FC) for storing the insertion of the first coin. Each of these areas 91-99, 101-10
5 is reset in advance prior to processing by the CPU 50.

Now, referring to FIG. 2, fare revision processing by the CPU 50 is executed as follows. first,
The fare revision date is read from the storage area 83 of the ROM 57 (step 1), and the date set in the date setter 54 is read (step 2). As mentioned above, the date set in the date setter 54 is changed daily by the station staff and represents the year, month, and day of that day. The fare revision date read from the area 83 is compared with the date on the date setter 54 (step 3), and if the date is less than the fare revision date, the fare revision date has not yet arrived, so step 4 is performed.
Then, the old fare stored in the old fare storage area 81 of the ROM 57 is read out, and the vehicle is driven based on this old fare. If the date on the date setter 54 is equal to or past the fare revision date,
Proceeding to step 5, the driver drives with the new fare stored in the new fare storage area 82 of the ROM 57. The reading processing in steps 1 and 2 and the judgment in step 3 only need to be performed once before the day's operation. Then, the judgment result of step 3 is stored in the RAM 58.
It is preferable to store the information in an appropriate storage area (not shown).

The ROM 57, which stores old fares and new fares, is normally a one-chip memory and is replaced on an appropriate date prior to the fare revision date. As shown in FIG. 3, in the initial period, the new fare A is stored in the storage area 82.
1 is stored and no data is stored in the storage areas 81 and 83, and the CPU 50 executes ticket sales processing based on the fare A1 of the area 82. For the first fare revision, the previous fare A will be stored in memory area 81 as the old fare.
1 is stored, a new fare A2 due to the revision is stored in the storage area 82, and a ROM 57b is prepared in which the first fare revision date C1 is stored in the storage area 83. It will be replaced with ROM57a on the same day. ROM
When 57a and 57b are exchanged, the CPU 50 executes the ticket issuing process using the fare in this new ROM 57b, but as mentioned above, until the fare revision date C1 arrives, the CPU 50 uses the fare A1 of area 81, and uses the fare A1 on the fare revision date C1.
Thereafter, processing is performed based on the new fare A2 of area 82. After this, when there is a second fare revision, a new fare is created that stores the above fare A2, the new fare A3, and the second fare revision date C2.
ROM57c is prepared, and this new ROM57c and ROM57b are installed on an appropriate day before the fare revision date C2.
are exchanged.

Since the old fare, new fare, and fare revision date are stored in the ROM57 in this way, the ROM57
ROM5 after replacement work and automatic ticket vending machine
The work to check whether the system is working properly in step 7 can be carried out at any date and time before the fare revision date. Referring to FIG. 4, when the ROM 57 is replaced, the date on the date setter 54 has not yet reached the fare revision date, so the automatic ticket vending machine should operate with the old fare in area 81. This makes it possible to
A confirmation is made as to whether or not to drive using the old fare in the storage area 81 of the ROM 57. If the date on the date setter 54 is artificially set to the fare revision date or later, the automatic ticket vending machine should operate with the new fare in area 82. A confirmation will be made to confirm whether or not you wish to drive at the new fare. new rom
If normal operation is confirmed in step 57, the date on the date setter 54 is reset to its original value. The automatic ticket vending machine will then operate at the old fare from this time until the fare revision date, and at the new fare after the fare revision date.

In addition, two memory chips are prepared as the memory 57, and one chip stores the old fare and the other chip stores the new fare.
Each chip may store the fare revision date at which the fare should be changed to the respective fare. When the next fare is revised, the memory chip storing the old fare is replaced with a separately prepared memory chip for the next new fare. The memory chip for the next new fare prepared for this purpose stores the fare revision date at which the fare should be changed to the fare in this memory chip. The new fare stored in the memory chip in which the above-mentioned new fare has been stored becomes the old fare by the above-mentioned chip exchange.

Finally, with reference to FIG. 5, the fare display processing by the CPU 50 will be described in the case of the old fare in the storage area 81. The same applies to the new fare in storage area 82. First, when coin insertion is detected from the standby state (step 11), it is checked whether the flag FC is set and it is determined whether the inserted coin is the first coin (step 12). If the flag FC is not set, proceed to step 13 and display all fares for the company's routes in tube 41.
~49 will be displayed. This process is executed by sequentially reading out the fares stored in the storage area 60 of the company's route account from the storage locations 61 to 69 and sending them to the numerical display tubes 41-49. As a result, display tubes 41 to 49 display 70, 90, ......, 270.
(Yen) and other fares are displayed. Therefore, passengers can know the fares for all sections at this point. Flag after this fare display
The FC is set (step 14), and the process proceeds to step 15, where the total amount P inserted is calculated based on the genuine coin signal from the coin verification device 53 and stored in the area 101. Then, the content n of the counter 103 is +1
(Step 16). Since the contents of the counter 103 are initially 0, the contents become 1 by the processing in step 16. In step 17, the fare Q in the storage location specified by the content n of the counter 103 in the area 60 of the company's route account is read out. Each memory location 61 to 69 in the memory area 60
are assigned addresses such as the first, second, etc., starting from the storage location 61 and moving toward the storage location 69, and these addresses are designated by the contents of the counter 103. If n=1, storage location 61 is designated and its fare 70 (yen) is read out. Next, use this read fare Q and step 1.
Input amount P calculated in step 5 and stored in area 101
(step 18), and if P≧Q, the process advances to step 19 and sets the flag corresponding to the read fare among flags 91-99. If the fare in the storage location 61 is read in step 17, a flag 91 is set. This causes the switch 31 to light up. After this, the process returns to step 16 and the content n of the counter 103 is increased by 1 again.
Then, since the content n of the counter 103 becomes 2, the fare from the storage location 62 is read out (step 1).
7) and compared with the total input amount P (step 18).
In this way, the switches 31, 32, etc. corresponding to the fare equal to or less than the total amount of money input are lit. For example, when 100 yen is inserted, switches 31 and 32 light up.

If P<Q in step 18, step 2
0, and subtract 1 from the content n of the counter 103.
It is determined whether the next coin has been inserted based on the genuine coin signal from the coin verification device 53 (step 2).
1). Subsequently, if a coin has been inserted, the amount is read, and the process returns to step 12 to check whether the flag FC is set. Since the flag FC has already been set, proceed to step 15, and add the input amount read this time to the total input amount P up to the previous time stored in the area 101, and set it in the area as the total input amount P up to this time. Store in 101. Then, steps 16 to 19 are repeated in the same manner. If the input amount read this time is 100 yen, the total input amount P is 200 yen, and flags 91 to 9
6 is set and the pushbutton switches 31 to 36
lights up.

If it is determined in step 21 that no coins have been inserted yet, press the other company route selection pushbutton.
Check whether switch 51 or 52 is pressed (step 22), and press these switches 5.
If either 1 or 52 is pressed, flags 91 to 99 are reset, and the memory area 7 corresponding to the pressed other company route selection pushbutton switch is reset.
The fare stored in 0 or 75 is displayed on a predetermined display tube among the numerical display tubes 41 to 49 (step 23). For example, pushbutton switch 51
When is pressed, the four types of fares in the area 70 are displayed on the numerical display tubes 41-44. As a result, if the user presses the route selection pushbutton switch 51 or 52 after inserting at least the first coin, all fares for the selected route will be displayed. The process at step 23 is executed in the same way as the process at step 13 by sequentially reading out the contents of area 70 and sending them to display tubes 41-44. Then, in the same way as steps 16 to 19, the content m of the counter 104 is incremented by 1 (step 2
4) Read the fare R in the area 70 specified by the content m of the counter 104 (step 2).
5) Compare this fare R with the total input amount P calculated in step 15 (step 26), and
If ≧R, flags are set sequentially starting from flag 91 (step 27). After this, the process returns to step 23 and the same process is repeated. In steps 25 to 27, if the content m of the counter 104 is 1, the storage location 71 of the area 70 is designated and the fare stored in that storage location is read out, and if P≧R, the flag 91 is set. Ru. Further, when m=2, the storage location 72 is specified, and when P≧R, the flag 92 is set.

If NO in step 22 or 26, the process moves to step 28, where it is determined whether any of the account selection pushbuttons/switches 31 to 39 that are lit is pressed, and the button/switch is lit. If any of the account selection pushbuttons/switches in 29). This is processed by leaving and resetting only the flag corresponding to the pressed account selection pushbutton switch among flags 91-99. Then, a printing device 55 and a magnetic recording device 56
Performs normal ticket issuing processing such as printing on recording paper and magnetic recording, discharging the ticket after this processing, and discharging change (Step 3).
0), returns to standby state. Note that unless the account selection pushbutton/switch is pressed (step 2)
8), return to step 21, and step 21, 22
Repeat steps 28 to 28.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Figure 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an automatic ticket vending machine.
Figure 2 is a flow chart showing the procedure for carrying out this invention.
FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing how the memory is replaced, FIG. 4 is a time chart showing the confirmation work procedure, and FIG. 5 is a flow chart showing the amount display procedure. 31-39...account selection push button/switch,
41-49...Numeric display tube, 50...CPU (central processing unit), 54...Date setter, 57, 57
a to 57c...ROM (memory), 81...Old fare (charge) storage area, 82...New fare (charge) storage area, 83...Fare revision date (fare change date) storage area.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A plurality of numeric displays that display account charges, a plurality of account selection push buttons/switches provided corresponding to these numeric displays, a memory that stores account charges in advance, and the numeric display mentioned above. In a vending machine equipped with a central processing unit that controls sales processing such as price display, amount calculation, and discharging goods, the memory stores in advance the price before the change, the price after the change, and the date of the price change. A date setter that can change the set date is provided on the side where the vending machine is operated by an attendant, and the date on the date setter is compared with the rate change date stored in the memory, and according to the result of this comparison, A method for changing charges in a vending machine, which reads out either the charge before the change or the charge after the change, and displays the charge on the numerical display and executes sales processing based on the read charge.